Remote control units have now become commonplace for operating various electronic devices, such as television sets, set top boxes, DVD players, audio amplifiers, and the like. Indeed, many consumers who have a combination of such consumer electronic devices connected together to form a home entertainment system find themselves frustrated with the need to find the appropriate remote control unit from among a collection of such units for controlling a specific device. Moreover, each consumer electronic device typically utilizes a remote control unit with its own keypad layout. Thus, the user must remember the features of each remote unit in order to operate the corresponding device controlled thereby.
To overcome this problem, several manufactures now offer a single remote control unit capable of operating a variety of different consumer electronic devices. Such combination remote units generally tend to suffer from high cost and complexity, especially with regard to the programming required to assure a proper interface between the remote control unit and each device controlled thereby. As a consequence, such remote control units have not enjoyed widespread acceptance by consumers.
Thus, a need exits for a remote control unit for controlling multiple consumer electronic devices which overcomes the aforementioned disadvantages.